Thursday, March 5, 2015

Hi there, everyone... It's Olivia, your crazy friend down the street... lol You know the one... She's a good egg, but just a little cracked... (Hey, the cracks build character!!! lol)

So earlier today, I learned that one of my high school classmates died yesterday. I can still see her face in my mind... well, more than her face... Let me explain. I remember lusting after this girl for the entire four years of high school. I had thought that she was just the most gorgeous creature I'd ever seen... Petite, flaming red hair, a generous spray of freckles on a pretty face with a cute button nose and full lips that I had dreamed about kissing more times than I can count... I can remember sitting behind her in a few classes we both had... Let's just say that... erm, I quite enjoyed the view from there... She was very attractive.

So why do I mention my former classmate, other than to establish myself as a completely unrepentant raging horndog?!? Those of you who've read this blog before have probably already guessed that I'm a horndog by now... lol No, I mention her because of the manner in which she died; by an overdose of a drug I'm quite thankful to number among the few I haven't tried: heroin. I have quite the laundry list of drugs that I've wasted my time and money on in the past... mostly marijuana, but I've tried cocaine, crack, opium, hashish, acid, alcohol, and various inhalants. I think that I'm finally having a small bit of success in getting off that roller coaster (about 2 months clean and sober!!!) because I am now FINALLY dealing with what I believe is the reason I made all the bad choices I did... I was trying to push away the feelings I'd had of being transgender. I guess that even as a high school student, I was having these feelings; but had no idea what they were, what they meant or why I was having them.

I can't help but think, "there but for the grace of God go I..." I mean that I could have just as easily chosen to add heroin to the multifarious list of mood-altering substances I've ingested over the years... I'd certainly demonstrated a desire to "escape" the feelings I had, whether those feelings were self-pity, loneliness, self-hatred, or just feeling generally inadequate compared to my peers... I could have followed that same route, and ended up in the same place. "That could've been me..."

I'm left now to wonder just what she had been going through (we didn't really know each other well at all) that made her believe that heroin was a viable alternative. I'm not naive enough to think that I could have rescued her from whatever demons might have been lurking in her life, for whatever reasons I may have wanted to try to do so. It really makes me curious as to what kind of problems a beautiful lady like that would have, that would make her choose not only drugs; but a drug that has killed SO many people indiscriminately. Why would someone who had all that beauty and promise make that choice?

And all this time, I had thought that she and I were completely different people... Maybe that's one of the reasons I was attracted to her... ("Opposites attract" is the old saw...) But the more I think about it... and what little I knew of her... I see how similar we actually were. We were both searching for happiness and acceptance, we both seemed to think we'd receive it from other people instead of finding it within ourselves, and we both turned to drugs as a means of trying to cope with reality... And little did I know it at the time, but we were both women... although, I have the horrendous problem of being cursed with an entirely male-looking body- but I'm working on changing that!!!

I guess that certain things affect different people in different ways... I will mourn my former classmate's loss for sure, as I did with another former classmate who died of leukemia. But I think I'll really take away something very different from this... No matter HOW much someone seems to have things all together on the outside; inside, they could be fighting a battle that you can't even begin to understand. (And you would think that I would have known that already... Not so, amigo... Not so.)

Rest in peace, my friend. Rest in peace. And thank you for the time we had together; and for what you taught me, both in the past and today. Thank you.